Expected Arrival
by sharnii
Summary: 10 years after the fairytale-nightmare that was Ohtori Academy Juri and Utena are romantic partners. But Utena has a "cookies & tea" date with one Himemiya Anthy...


Expected Arrival

_by sharnii_

It happened when they were having tea together, ten years after the fairytale-nightmare of Ohtori. Juri had awakened thinking something very bad was going to happen…and had promptly cut the foolish thought in the bud. Omens and portents: stuff and nonsense.

Still, she felt strangely adrift as she gazed across their low table, helplessly watching Utena's so-familiar fingers fidget with her teacup. There was something…threatening about the anxious way Utena kept glancing at the door.

As though she was expecting it to open.

As though she was expecting someone to be standing there.

Someone else.

_Her._

"What's wrong?" Juri asked smoothly, masking insecurity beneath a layer of icy beauty. Utena's eyes flickered up to hers then back to the door, then down to her tea. A telltale flush stained her cheeks. She'd always been one to blush at any and every provocation. Juri found it endearing and aggravating in turn. Right now she found it frightening.

"What do you mean?" Utena sounded nervous. Juri grimaced; she loathed evasiveness, and it was unlike Utena in the extreme.

"I mean it's our ninth anniversary and you keep looking at the door. Expecting someone?"

"…No," said Utena slowly, and then, "Sorry, Juri, it's just I, y'know, I had that conversation with Himemiya that we would…"

"Have tea and cookies. Ten years after. Yes, yes I remember." Juri grimaced again.

"Poisoned tea and cookies," corrected Utena, almost dreamily. Juri felt her throat tighten.

"Lovely. Do you realize you've been stirring that lump of sugar into your tea for the last five minutes?"

"What? Oh sorry. Juri…" Utena blinked furiously and put her spoon down. "Sorry," she said again, shoulders drooping.

"Don't apologize," said Juri, "just give me my present." She smiled as Utena's shoulders straightened and her partner grinned back.

"It's like that, is it? Well, it's not like I have taste that can match the great Arisugawa-san's…"

"Stop it." A faint blush.

"But I'm told these are very in this year. And perfect for a redhead."

"You think I'm a redhead?" Juri accepted the jewelry box with real pleasure, enjoying the way their fingers lingered in the exchange. It was true Utena didn't have much taste in fashion but over the years she'd learned to ask for help from the right people. She'd had to: Juri had impeccable taste.

"Well…" Utena smirked. "They'll look beautiful no matter what color your hair is…" She shrugged. "Everything always does." She blushed right on queue.

Juri smiled and flicked open the box. The pearl-drop earrings made her gasp.

"You like 'em?" Utena was at her side suddenly; they were kneeling thigh to thigh. Long fingers blazed heat along Juri's face, smoothing over her high cheekbones (model's cheekbones she'd always been told), deftly pushing ringlets behind her ears.

"I do." Juri's voice was low and heated as she leaned into Utena's touch, allowing the younger girl to slip the earrings on. "But I like you even more."

"You're such a sweet-talker." Utena was laughing now, enjoying their banter, enjoying their charged interaction in a way that had taken a very long time to happen.

Juri turned her face down a little (thank God she was still taller), and slipped a hand into Utena's hair at the nape of her neck. She raised an eyebrow, enjoying the way Utena's pupils (predictably) dilated, how her delicate lips parted just so.

"That's not all I'm good at."

"Really?" husked Utena, half a challenge. Juri kissed her, enjoying the way Utena met her back halfway, the way they smiled against each other's lips, the way it was never quite certain who was kissing who. This kiss had all the breathless confrontation of the first one, and all the nostalgia of the countless kisses in between. Juri closed her eyes, losing herself in the wholehearted passion that was Utena…

The doorbell rang.

They broke apart, panting.

"Should I get it?" Utena started to get up, but Juri pushed her down to rise herself. She spared a glance for the other girl, unsurprised to see her staring at the door with uncontrolled and unabashed hope. Juri hated her for it…such a strange feeling to have about someone you loved so very much.

"I will," she said crisply, striding forward. Best to get this over with. Best to rip off the bandage and start staunching the bloodflow. Yes, it was best to find out if miracles really could happen, if nightmares would come true.

She swung the door wide.

Himemiya Anthy smiled up at her.

Juri stared. For a moment she swayed in place, disbelieving although this was exactly whom she'd expected to see. For a moment an orange rose flashed before her mind's eye, proffered to her by the very hand that might at any moment be proffered in a polite western handshake (God forbid).

"You," she said in a dead voice, because really what else was there to say?

"Himemiya!" cried Utena ecstatically from somewhere behind her.

Himemiya Anthy looked right past Juri as though she wasn't even there. She smiled at Utena in a way that made Juri think of Shiori back when they had been best friends, and Utena the first time she and Utena had made love, and of everything warm and human.

"Utena," Anthy murmured, honorific conspicuously absent. And then she was shoving (yes shoving) past the frozen Juri to throw herself into Utena's eager embrace.

* * *

It was almost exactly one year after Ohtori when Juri met Utena again. She was in a flower shop looking for the right roses to send Shiori, roses that said something like: "I actually only ever wanted to be your friend (ha ha how strange that you thought otherwise), but if you did ever want something more from me, then wouldn't I be a wonderful option?" It was hard to find roses that said all that, and even harder when it wasn't the (humiliating) truth anyway.

"I'm looking for roses," she had stated to the salesclerk's back, thinking that the woman's hair was a shade of pink she'd only ever seen on that annoying girl who liked to preach the virtues of nobility (whatever had happened to her? Hadn't she drowned or something? How depressing). The clerk whirled around to gape at her, and to Juri's shock she found herself staring at the strange half-remembered prince-girl herself.

"U…Utena-kun?" she asked, because that was the name that came to mind, suddenly and out of nowhere.

"Juri-senpai!" said the girl, and she looked surprised and excited all at once. "Wow, it really is you."

"What are you doing here?" asked Juri, as she scrabbled wildly at her memories, fighting for composure. "I thought…I thought you…didn't like flowers…"

"You mean because I'm a tomboy?" Utena laughed self-deprecatingly. "Yeah, well, Himemiya once said she wanted to work in a flower shop. After we graduated I mean. And hey, well, I guess this is kinda like graduating and…" She blinked and stopped, staring at Juri. "Um…you've graduated from Ohtori?"

"Yes…" said Juri slowly, thinking:

_Himemiya? That freak with the glasses?_ She shivered for no particular reason.

Utena rambled on.

"Yeah, so Himemiya said she'd work someplace like this, and I…I guess…"

She looked sad for a moment, and oddly young.

"…I thought if I worked someplace like this, maybe I'd meet her again even sooner. Or I'd, I dunno, be closer to her or something." She laughed a little and shrugged. "It's silly I know."

"It sounds sweet," said Juri, in a tone that said it was extremely silly. Utena flushed. Juri found herself oddly charmed by the reaction and took a step back to cover her own confusion. For some reason her hand rose to cradle her locket, where it rested in the scoop-neck of her elegant white blouse. Utena's gaze followed and she gasped out:

"You still have the locket…"

_How does she know about my locket?!_

"It's new," Juri said coldly. It was actually the third replica. The first had broken in some kind of fencing accident she barely remembered, the second had gotten crushed into a permanently closed clasp under a piece of fallen rubble. (It was another freak accident – nobody knew where the rubble came from, it looked like a castle turret of all things, and it was next to impossible that it should have caught her locket where it lay on her bedroom windowsill). Impossible. And such a waste of a photo that had been very important to her. Although she couldn't quite remember whom that photo had been of…

The latest locket was made of platinum (more durable than gold) and boasted Shiori version 2, courtesy of Miki's graduation book. Hopefully he'd never look past the page that bore photos of himself and his twin. He'd certainly never called her on it; they belonged to a fencing club together, and still went for friendly cups of tea.

"I'm sorry, who are you?" Juri asked directly, putting a hand to her suddenly pounding head. Utena stared at her, eyes huge and shimmering with compassion.

_They're so blue,_ Juri found herself thinking. _Like the sky. Like the sky on that day, that last day, when we played squash and laughed about the future…_

What day?

Clearly they knew each other. But how?

"Tenjou Utena," said the girl proudly, and she crossed her arms and scowled at Juri then, in a way that was endearing and just a tad alarming. "So you don't remember me either, huh? I'm so sick of that. Geez, I hope Himemiya remembers…"

"Himemiya?" echoed Juri weakly, not caring in the slightest who that was.

But she already cared a very great deal who Tenjou Utena might be.

* * *

The three of them knelt at the table, sipping tea made by Juri and eating cookies brought by Anthy.

_It's a nightmare,_ thought Juri where she knelt at the head, staring down the table-length at Utena and Anthy across from each other. They were devouring each other more than any food and drink, and all with eyes alone.

She felt sick. She actually felt sweat beading on her forehead.

_It's a goddamn nightmare. _

"How'd you find me?" Utena's voice was hushed, joyous, different from any voice she used with Juri at any time. Frightening in its unfamiliarity.

"There was an article about Arisugawa-san," revealed Anthy, "in Top Modeling Monthly, and she mentioned her partner by name."

Juri swore at herself internally.

"Oh," Utena blushed to her roots, and stared down into her tea. "Oh, that was lucky."

"Yes." Anthy sipped her tea but didn't take her eyes away from Utena. "Thank you, Arisugawa-san."

"No problem," said Juri politely, bitterly. "My pleasure to help you reunite."

"I'm so glad…so glad that…" Utena broke off her sudden declaration to gaze back at Anthy, heart in her eyes. Juri fought the urge to roll her own.

"I know," said Anthy with a small knowing smile that gave Juri the creeps. Anthy reached across the table palm up, and to Juri's disquiet Utena's hand covered hers immediately. Juri stared at their clasped hands: they looked so natural together.

"Someday together," murmured Utena, and tears started rolling down her cheeks. Anthy lifted their hands to press her prince's hand to her own cheek.

Juri sat on her hands. It seemed prudent.

* * *

"So we knew each other then?" Juri's voice was crisp.

She was with Utena in a café just across the street from the flower shop, having tea and cakes. The strange (but cute!) girl had just told a fantastic story about floating castles, and searching for her childhood prince, and duels fought to change the world (what the fuck?!).

Juri thought it was all a bit much, but at the same time the more they talked the more she did remember things about this girl. Like Tenjou Utena being good at sport. Insanely good. She'd been a straight-forward jock, and popular with the student-body, not unlike Juri herself. As far as Juri could remember they hadn't been close (and why not?)…Juri had been on the student council and captain of the fencing team, neither of which had involved Utena.

Only they had. Somehow…

"Yeah, we did," confirmed Utena, licking cake crumbs from her lips. "Look…I can see you think this is a bunch of lies."

"Not lies," corrected Juri, "more…embellishments perhaps? I mean you must admit, your story isn't very logical."

"Sure," said Utena frankly, "but it's true."

They stared at each other over the table.

"More tea?" asked a passing waitress.

"No thanks," said Utena, but not without turning to study the waitress with a kind of probing intensity that Juri didn't understand. It was almost like she was looking for something that simply wasn't there, trying to will it into being.

"Look, Juri-senpai," said Utena finally, turning back, "I'd like us to stay in touch. Maybe we can talk about our memories some more."

Juri leaned across the table without even thinking about it.

"I don't know about more memory talk, but I'd like to take you to dinner." She placed a bold hand on Utena's and watched charmed as the younger girl's blood vessels practically burst out of her face.

"J…J…Juri-senpai," stuttered Utena, pulling her hand away as fast as was physically possible. Juri thought she wouldn't be surprised if Utena started wiping it on her slacks. "I…I'm not…I'm not…"

"Interested?" wondered Juri, leaning in a little closer.

"Er…" Utena's blush increased in intensity, if such a thing was possible. "I…I'm not like you."

"What do you mean?" purred Juri, beginning to enjoy herself. Utena actually squirmed in place.

"I…that is…I…dinner sounds nice. Yeah, why not. Friends do it all the time. Right?"

"Friends?" asked Juri as she found a pen and began to write out her phone number on a serviette.

Drops of sweat beaded on Utena's brow and her fidgeting grew worse.

"Do I have to dress up?" she asked, obviously trying to change the subject.

"You don't like that much, do you?" said Juri absently, enjoying the spark of their brushing fingers as she handed over her number.

"You remember that?" Utena's eyes were wide, and Juri found her own eyes growing wide as she gazed back.

"Yes…" she said, "Yes I do…" Utena tucked the serviette into her jacket pocket and looked smug.

"Kind of a friend sort of thing to remember," she said pointedly.

It was Juri's turn to blush.

* * *

"What do you mean she's living next door?!" Juri spoke through clenched teeth, trying to stay as quiet as possible. After all it was impossible to tell whether their brand new neighbor HIMEMIYA ANTHY OF ALL FUCKING PEOPLE might be listening with a glass pressed up against the wall.

Utena shrugged helplessly.

"Juri, please," she urged, also keeping her voice low. "She's…she's Himemiya." Her voice took on a meaningful edge. "Himemiya." She stared mournfully at Juri.

"That's what I'm afraid of," muttered Juri, turning her back and sliding into her side of the bed.

"It's not like that," pleaded Utena but Juri noted her partner was looking everywhere but her. "I swear it's not like that. I told you that back at Ohtori!"

Juri hmphed. It was friggin' _Himemiya Anthy_. How could it not be like that?

She remembered very well the way Kyouichi Saionji (whom she'd previously thought was in unrequited love with Touga) had gone to crazy little pieces for love of the rose bride. She remembered her good friend Miki who just wasn't interested in girls, becoming very interested. She seemed to remember Utena herself defending Anthy's every malicious move with ignorant enthusiasm.

How could it not be like that?!

"That girl…woman," she corrected herself, "is manipulation personified. I don't trust her."

"What?" Utena sounded pained and confused. She slid into the other side of the bed.

"She's trouble," clarified Juri, turning to face her. "I know you don't think so but then you've always had a soft spot for her. You saved her from her brother, and that was admirable, but Utena…you can't save people from themselves."

"It's not like that," argued Utena desperately, passionately. "She's not like that."

Juri fought the urge to laugh in Utena's face. They had both come to understand and accept that while Utena was an incurable optimist, Juri was a realist (dreary pessimist, Utena called it). Laughing at Utena wouldn't win her any arguments.

"I don't like it," she told Utena instead, "I don't want her in our lives." She hadn't meant to go as far as that, but hell, it was true. It was only the goddamn truth. And right now the truth needed to be said. "She'll ruin everything," she whispered, and turned away furiously, so Utena wouldn't see her cry. (Years later and she still refused to let Utena see her cry…)

Seconds later and Utena's warm body was pressed to her back, while strong arms embraced her.

"She won't," promised Utena urgently. "You'll see, Juri, with time, you'll see. I want us all to be friends, good friends! We can make this work; it's so important to me."

Juri shuddered.

Utena brushed Juri's masses of curls aside and pressed a kiss to her neck.

Juri shivered against the kiss.

"I don't like it," she whispered again, and felt those lips pause in their ministrations.

"You'll see," said Utena as firmly as if she was willing it into being, there and then.

But Juri knew she never would. Just as she knew that this time, stubborn and persuasive though she might be, she'd never change Utena's mind.

TBC


End file.
